Out of Africa? What do genes tell us?
Genetic diversity patterns in nuclear versus mitochondrial systems and in low versus high mutation rate systems do not support the hypothesis of a recent African origin for all of humanity following a split between Africans and non-Africans 100,000 years ago, nor do genetic distance data. Geographical analyses of nuclear and mitochondrial gene trees do not support the hypothesis of a recent global replacement of humans coming out of Africa, although a local replacement event in Europe is indicated by these analyses and recent studies on Neandertal DNA. The gene tree analyses instead indicate that genetic interchanges have ensured that all of humanity has evolved as a single evolutionary lineage with no major splits.
Templeton
A R
AR
Department of Biology, Washington University, St. Louis, Missouri 63130-4899, USA. temple-a@biodec.wustl.edu
D000349:Africa; D000818:Animals; D005075:Biological Evolution; D014644:Genetic Variation; D006239:Haplotypes; D015186:Hominidae / Q000235:genetics*; D006801:Humans; D008957:Models, Genetic